Many internal and external factors affect how we think, feel, and behave. Necessity knows no law, and heeds no risk. The natural wants of humans are few, and easily supplied; but the artificial are infinite, and insatiable. The straight warp of necessity, not to be swerved from its ultimate course, its every alternating vibration, indeed, only tending to that’ freewill still free to ply her shuttle between threads; and chance, though restrained in its play within the right lines of necessity, and sideways in its motions modified by freewill, though thus prescribed to by both, chance by turns rules either, and has the last featuring blow at events. The necessity of sitting still in the building with one’s enemies is in itself irksome. And then there comes some crisis in which one cannot sit still. Why should one want to be better than their neighbors? Let one be thankful if one is no worse. Research has shown that being too tense and/or living with too much stress has a significant and extremely negative impact on our lives.  It can lead to physical illnesses such as high blood pressure, ulcers, fatigue, heart attack, stroke, muscle pain, and headaches and many psychological issues, including inappropriate or misdirected emotions, confusion, difficulty concentrating, exhaustion, and death. No civilized person ever regrets a pleasure, and no uncivilized person ever knows what pleasure is. Anything becomes pleasure if one does it too often. Because the mind and body are one, these components need to be synchronized for any relaxation technique to work. Our likings are regulated by our regulated by our circumstances. The artist prefers a hilly country because it is picturesque; the engineer a flat one because it is convenient. There are different forms of relaxation, including imagery, meditation, yoga, breathing exercises, deep muscle relaxation, and progressive muscle relaxation. To minds strongly marked by the positive and negative qualities that create severity, strength of will, conscious rectitude of purpose, narrowness of imagination and intellect, great power of self-control, and a disposition to exert control over others, prejudices come as the natural food of tendencies which can get no sustenance out of that complex, fragmentary, doubt provoking knowledge, which we call truth.  There are a number of ways to demonstrate intelligence or adaptive functioning. Intelligence is not something we can see or hear, or taste. We can see the results of intelligence, typically.

While we can think to maintain the rights of our own individuality against every human combination, let us not forget to caution all who are disposed to waver that there is a cowardice which is criminal, and a longing for rest which it is baseness to indulge. There are three types of intelligence:  analytical, or the ability to solve a problem by looking at its components; creative, the ability to use new or ingenious ways to solve problems; and practical, referring to common sense or knowledge of the world and people. The mind of a person is as a country which was once open to squatters, who have bred and multiplied and become masters of the land. However, then happeneth a time when new and hungry comers dispute the land; and there is a trial of strength, and the stronger wins. A well informed mind is the best security against the contagion of folly and vice. People who are always unhappy, talking about others, jealous of others, or trying to set someone up are considered mentally ill. Mental illness can have a devastating effect on an individual, his or her family and friend, and on the community in many ways. The mind is strongly indicated by its outward dress. Suffering minds will be partial to their own causes and merits. If the mind be not engaged, there is hardly any confinement sufficient for the body! Not too long ago when people heard the term mentally ill, many thought of severe cases and associated these individuals with inexplicable behavior, forcefulness, violence, and a lack of caring about themselves and the world.  In this sense, people with mental illness were almost dehumanized.  They were avoided and feared. I am shocked to find a man have sublime ideas in his head, and nothing but illiberal sentiments in his heart. To think the man, whose ample mind must grasp whatever yonder stars survey, what is your opinion of that image of the mind’s grasping the whole universe? The mind sits terrified at the objects she has magnified herself and blackened; reduce them to their proper size and hue, she overlooks them. Can delicate mind be united to each other but by delicate observances? It is possible that you are not mentally ill, but you are fragile, after enduring physical, emotional, and verbal abuse. We finally understand that needing help for mental or emotional reasons does not represent a character flaw. This is changing now as people understand that mental illness. It is clear to see that depression does not mean weakness, anxiety does not mean fear, and that schizophrenia does not necessarily involve violence. To say that you are responsible for the way people treats you is the same as saying you have power over others, and they do not have free will. Suffering minds will be partial to their own causes and merits. The mind is ductile: but images, ductile received into it, need a certain time to harden and bake in their impression. The mind does not exist unless leagued with the soul. The beginning of a motive life must be in the head.  We are in the early stages of this enlightenment, however, and many people continue to stereotype the mentally ill population.

Those who think nothing is wrong with them and do not seek help usually are the ones who are the most mentally ill.  It is usual with the human mind to skip from one extreme to its opposite, as easily, and almost as suddenly as a bird from one bough to another. The mind deceives itself by its own acuteness. The mind is the master of itself; and is endowed with powers that might enable it to laugh at the tyrant’s vigilance. First of all, imagine being labeled as weak, fearful, violent, or flawed.  What would this do to your self-respect?  Certainly nothing positive.  These misguided beliefs can eventually reach the individual, and cause a drastic shift in their belief system, which may then lead to a mental illness. However, I have ever perceived, that where the mind was capacious, the affections were good. It is a certain elevation of mind alone, a sensibility of what is great and good, a comprehensive view of what is desirable or contemptible, which sets a man above the common level, and shows him everything in its true light. To the mind, as to the eye, it is difficult to compare with exactness objects vast in their extent and various in their parts. A good mind ought to be incited, a bad mind restrained. When everyone attacks you and call you crazy, it will lower yourself self-esteem and you may engage in risky behavior, like drinking with people you do not know well, and that may be what their intensions are. I have a friend who everyone called crazy and made up a lot of vicious lies about. So many people were attacking him that he went out and drank with a guy. This guy then invited the young man back to his apartment, pushed him to the ground and sodomized him. When the young man went to the doctor, he was all bruised up and it was determined that he broke his back. The guy said to himself, “Everyone cannot be wrong, I must be a terrible person to let this happen.”  The results were a deeper depression, increased anxiety, lower self-esteem, and isolation, to name only a few. It turns out that his mind is fine, but he was being terrorized and no one would stand up for him and he could not defend himself, as he was well known, by society as being crazy and knew that he would get locked away for reporting the abuse or standing up for himself. However, a virtuous mind soon finds consolation in itself. It is natural to wish to be beloved by those we love. Of love, it may be said, the less Earthly the less demonstrative. In its absolutely indestructible from it reaches a profundity in which all exhibition of itself is painful. People of high intellectual endowments do not require similar ones in those they love. They are just the persons to appreciate the wholesome gush of natural feeling, the honest affection, the simple joy, the fullness of contentment with what they love.